


Lodged in the Memory

by SCFrankles



Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Community: watsons_woes, Gen, gentle humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-19
Packaged: 2018-05-14 23:46:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5763529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SCFrankles/pseuds/SCFrankles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Watson relates the full story behind him and Holmes taking lodgings together. It wasn't quite as plain sailing as STUD makes out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lodged in the Memory

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt: [A Day Late](http://watsons-woes.livejournal.com/1480380.html) at [Watson's Woes](http://watsons-woes.livejournal.com/) on LJ.
> 
> Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are the creations of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
> 
> * * *

Whether he is writing fact or writing fiction, every author has the responsibility of creating an engaging story. As I am sure my more astute readers realise, sometimes I will omit and rearrange facts in order to craft an interesting narrative. And so I must admit that the beginning of my association with Mr. Sherlock Holmes did not go quite as smoothly as I have portrayed it in ‘A Study in Scarlet’. Indeed our association was almost over before it had begun. Oh, our first meeting was much as I wrote it. It was what followed as we attempted to secure lodgings together that I simplified for the novel. However, our esteemed landlady Mrs. Hudson has now given permission for me to tell the full story and I think it may perhaps hold some interest for the Sherlock Holmes enthusiast.

We did indeed meet the next day at No. 221, Baker Street. Mrs. Hudson was temporarily absent on an errand but the young maid recognised Holmes from his first visit a few days before and allowed us both to go up and inspect the flat together. My first impression was as positive as Holmes’s had been and we decided almost immediately that we would indeed take the rooms. It only needed the owner’s consent and happily at that moment we heard Mrs. Hudson coming up the stairs to greet us.

It is at this point the true facts rather begin to diverge from my official account. Mrs. Hudson had some disappointing news for us.

Holmes was aghast. “You have rented the rooms to someone else? But I told you I had only to find a fellow lodger and I would take them!”

If I had not been so crestfallen myself, I would have been amused by the vehemence of Holmes’s indignation. However the landlady remained polite but firm.

“I’m sorry, sir. You gave me no guarantee that you could take the rooms and I cannot afford them to stand empty for too long. If you had only come yesterday—”

“But, madam—”

At this point we were interrupted by the lodger himself being shown up by the maid. He was a small, inoffensive-looking man, who appeared rather surprised to see a whole group of people waiting for him in his new accommodation, and who flinched somewhat at the glare that Sherlock Holmes directed at him.

The poor man turned to address Mrs. Hudson instead. “My bags and boxes are downstairs in the cab. Is it convenient for me to bring them up now and get settled in?”

Mrs. Hudson smiled at him. “Of course it is, Mr. Applethorpe. We shall leave you in peace.”

She made to leave and I prepared to follow her. Holmes however leaned in to talk to the successful tenant.

“But are you sure this is completely suitable for you, sir? Would you not be more comfortable somewhere else? Is that not a touch of woodworm in the floorboards? A touch of damp in the ceiling? And that wallpaper is truly—”

I watched the bemusement move across Mr. Applethorpe’s face and the annoyance begin to move across Mrs. Hudson’s and decided it might be best to interrupt.

“Thank you so much for allowing us to view the rooms, madam.”

I bowed to Mr. Applethorpe as well.

“We hope you will be very happy in your new home, sir.”

And I hurried Sherlock Holmes downstairs, where we were let out by the page and quickly found ourselves back on the pavement of Baker Street.

We looked at each other.

Holmes’s shoulders slumped.

“I knew I shouldn’t have told her I played the violin.”

I sighed, and nodded to him—at that point preparing to take my leave of him forever. It’s strange to think now but then I still considered him merely a useful acquaintance who could have shared this particular set of rooms with me.

However, Holmes had other ideas. Recovering rapidly, he straightened his shoulders once more.

“Well, no matter! I have many contacts. This is only one of many possibilities. We can begin to look round the others tomorrow!”

I must admit I found myself hesitating to throw in my lot with a stranger when there were not lodgings immediately on the horizon. To be truthful, I was already mentally planning my departure from London and going to the country after all. Not securing the rooms had rather depleted my spirits after my hopes had been raised. I shuddered internally at the thought my funds might diminish sufficiently to necessitate my taking up residence in one of the crowded lodging houses built for the more impoverished inhabitants of London.

“I really cannot stay in my current situation much longer,” I told Holmes.

He beamed. “Then come and stay with me!”

I considered. After all the man was not a complete stranger—we did have a mutual acquaintance in Stamford. And so I agreed.

 

 

I have to say it had not crossed my mind yet why Sherlock Holmes should have been searching for new accommodation. There were many reasons after all, negative and positive: wanting somewhere cheaper, somewhere larger, somewhere more convenient for work. However, I had assumed he was staying in temporary accommodation while he looked—in a hotel like myself—as he had told me he did not need to give notice before moving.

I was therefore a little surprised to find Holmes was still living in a set of rooms in a private house—in Montague Street, just round the corner from the British Museum. But that in it itself was nothing to cause anxiety. The thing that should have worried me perhaps was that Holmes insisted we enter through the back door and not draw too much attention to ourselves. However, it did not concern me unduly at the time.

Holmes’s lodgings consisted of two rooms—untidy but clean and respectable, though I did notice minor burn marks here and there. Holmes was able to offer me the use of his sofa and, as I hoped that it would not be for long, I accepted. Oddly, there seemed to be nobody else currently living in the house, not even any servants, but I imagined we could manage to shift for ourselves well enough.

I did query the lack of other inhabitants the morning after my first night spent there, when we were attempting to put breakfast together in the kitchen.

“Oh, my landlady has gone to stay with relatives,” said Holmes cheerfully. “Developed some kind of nervous complaint. The servants have been given notice and the house shut up.”

I was somewhat taken aback by Holmes’s lack of fellow feeling in the matter, and remembering our discreet entrance into the house began to become a little concerned.

“We do have the lady’s permission to be living here, I take it?” I asked cautiously.

Holmes nodded, slapping marmalade onto his toast. “I’ve paid enough rent for the rest of the month. We are well within our rights to be here.”

This did make me feel a little more comfortable but my sense of relief was tempered rather by Holmes’s next remark.

“We just have to be careful. Mrs. Sanderson said if she ever saw me round here again she would call the police. And there’s no use in looking for trouble!”

I gave him a weak smile. This at least explained his need for new accommodation. I was understandably disconcerted by his landlady’s reported antipathy but I reasoned to myself later that it was simply a byproduct of her nervous condition and should not be taken too seriously.

 

 

And so I found myself with a fellow lodger, even if strictly speaking I did not have the official lodgings to go with it. However, after our rudimentary breakfast, we began our task of searching for new rooms.

The first place seemed perfectly satisfactory to me. Not as impressive as Baker Street but a step up from Holmes’s rooms in Montague Street. But Holmes immediately homed in on each and every fault, and though individually I would have found them nothing to be concerned about, en masse they allowed Holmes to persuade me that we could do better. In the afternoon we tried again at a second house but unfortunately once again Holmes could only find the flaws.

And so it went on for the next several days. It was Holmes who found the places. He seemed to have an endless number of acquaintances, who had acquaintances, who had acquaintances with lodgings for rent. We went round one or two new sets of possible rooms every day but my companion was never satisfied.

The faults in the lodgings always seemed invisible to me at first but once Holmes had explained his observations, I wondered how I could have missed them. And I was grateful for his skills, even if I was becoming more and more frustrated at the thought of never finding a more permanent place to live.

In between the searching for acceptable accommodation Holmes carried on with his work, though I was not able to say exactly what it entailed. Callers from all walks of life would come to visit and consult with him. Unfortunately, I had no room to call my own and did not feel comfortable waiting in Mrs. Sanderson’s part of the house, and so I spent an awful lot of time strolling the nearby streets in order to give Holmes and his clients some privacy. I was curious about his line of work but felt we did not know each other well enough for me to simply ask.

 

 

However, I was soon to become fully and dramatically acquainted with his profession. One evening, some seven or eight days after Holmes and I first met, Mrs. Hudson’s maid came round to see Holmes. I was the one who opened the front door and I must confess that, this being some days after our visit to Baker Street, the girl’s face meant nothing to me. But when I took her up to Holmes’s rooms, he recognised her at once.

“Bessie, isn’t it? From Mrs. Hudson’s?”

The girl nodded, on the point of tears, and Holmes quickly sat her down in the only comfortable chair.

“But what has happened?”

She came quickly to the point. “Mrs. Hudson is missing! Me and Billy saw her last night but in the morning she’d already gone out and she still hasn’t come back.”

‘Billy’ I assumed was the page who had shown us out. I glanced from Bessie’s face to Holmes’s, unsure how seriously to take this.

Holmes frowned. He was clearly concerned by the girl’s distress but asked the obvious question. “Is it not too soon to be worried? She may be home before it’s time for you all to retire.”

“The police have said the same, sir. But she would not just leave us without giving us our tasks for the day and without telling us when she would be back. And…”

The girl hesitated but Holmes prompted her.

“Tell me. What is giving you concern?”

“Her coat is gone, sir. But she didn’t take her handbag.”

Holmes’s eyebrows rose.

“But surely a woman might do without her handbag for a few hours?” I suggested.

Holmes and Bessie turned and gave me twin looks of disbelief.

Holmes returned his attention to Bessie. “You did the right thing in coming to me. I will go to Baker Street with you and we will examine the house for further clues. Just wait downstairs for a moment and I will get ready.”

The girl smiled in relief and left to make her way down the stairs.

I regarded Holmes with some bemusement as he found his boots and began to put them on. “I admire your concern for the the situation, Holmes. But are you really the person to help? I’m not sure why the girl thought an unsuccessful tenant would be the man to ask for assistance.”

Holmes looked up at me and rolled his eyes. “You really are quite unobservant, aren’t you?”

I gave him rather a hurt look and he grinned. “She didn’t come to me because I was almost a tenant. She came here because of my _profession.”_ He looked thoughtful. “She probably got my address through her elder sister. If memory serves I sorted out a little matter for the sister’s employer…”

I stared at him. “But what _is_ your profession?”

“Why, I am a consulting detective—the only one in the world.” He finished tying his laces and smiled. “Why don’t you come with me and see what I do?”

He raised an eyebrow.

“And I’ve seen that you still have your old service revolver. That might be useful.”

I was feeling more and more uncertain. “Do you honestly think it will be necessary? Is Mrs. Hudson truly in danger?”

Holmes shrugged. “It is best to be prepared.” He looked at me. “Will you come?”

“Of course,” I said.

I still did not actually believe the landlady to be in any peril but I was keen for the anxiety of her young servants to be eased and I wanted to help to locate her if I could. I did think taking my revolver was somewhat excessive but at Holmes’s insistence I placed it in my pocket.

 

 

The three of us travelled back together in a four wheeler. Alighting outside 221, Baker Street, the door was opened by the page even before we had time to knock.

“Mr. Holmes has come to help!” said Bessie, and the pale-looking boy managed to give us a smile.

We entered the hall, and hung up our coats—Holmes already looking around, apparently trying to take in as much as possible.

He turned to Bessie. “You will forgive me if I ask, but you are sure Mrs. Hudson is not simply in her own quarters? She has not been taken ill, perhaps?”

Bessie shook her head. “We searched the whole house, of course, sir—me and Billy. And we spoke to Mr. Applethorpe. And his gentleman visitor too. They haven’t seen her either.”

Holmes nodded. “Well, then. Perhaps you could show me Mrs. Hudson’s bedroom.”

Bessie led us to it. I have to say I was feeling entirely uncomfortable at the thought of looking through a lady’s private room, imagining that at any moment she could return and demand to know what on earth we were doing.

However, Holmes insisted that I enter too. “A second pair of eyes might be helpful.”

I stood to one side and watched as Holmes made his examination of the room and its contents. I myself could not see anything that could be of use in determining where Mrs. Hudson had gone. Everything was neat and tidy and in good order. Nothing seemed disturbed or out of place.

Bessie anxiously watched Holmes too.

“No clothes seem to be missing, sir.”

“No…”

Holmes led the way out of the room again.

He stopped and smiled at Bessie. “Now, I think I might need someone else to take a look over the house. I wonder, could you and Billy go to Scotland Yard and ask an Inspector Lestrade to join us here? Just tell him Mr. Sherlock Holmes wants him and—” Holmes pulled out a notebook and pencil and rapidly scribbled down a message. “—give him this note.”

Bessie did not look reassured but after repeating “Inspector Lestrade” to be certain she had the name correct, she went to find her fellow servant.

Holmes’s expression became somewhat grimmer once we were alone.

“I did not wish to say anything in front of Bessie but I fear for Mrs. Hudson’s safety. Her coat is gone, yes, but her hat remains in the hall.”

“Could she not have taken another hat?” I asked. “There were others in her wardrobe.”

“Exactly. And did you notice any space where a hat could be missing? No, someone wishes us to think Mrs. Hudson went out but it is my belief that she never left this house.”

I looked at him in consternation. “But Bessie and the boy have searched the house from top to bottom.”

“They have searched the parts they have access to…”

I involuntarily glanced up towards 221B. “You’re not saying… you suspect the lodger?”

“I’m afraid I do.”

The situation was becoming more and more bizarre but I was oddly convinced by Holmes’s sincerity.

I shook my head. “So we wait until the inspector has arrived and then we search the lodger’s rooms?”

Holmes’s expression was serious. “I do not think we can afford to wait that long. Once the children are on their way to Scotland Yard and out of harm’s way, we will go up together. And see what we can see.”

 

 

Bessie and Billy had left the house. Holmes and I exchanged a look and we began to make our way upstairs—for my part, I suddenly felt a great deal less ridiculous about bringing a revolver. We reached the closed sitting room door of 221B, halted and glanced at each other. Then Holmes turned and knocked firmly. There was a brief pause and the door was opened by the lodger we had met so briefly several days before.

The timid face looked up at us, and for a moment I was convinced Holmes had read the situation completely wrongly. Of course this man had nothing to do with Mrs. Hudson’s disappearance! The poor woman had probably been called away on urgent family business and was even now on her way home to find two demented men accusing her lodger of abducting her.

But Holmes merely smiled. “Excuse me,” he said to Mr. Applethorpe. “We are here because we are concerned about Mrs. Hudson.”

And even though there was no direct accusation in those words, I saw the guilt flit briefly across the man’s features as clear as day.

Through the open door we saw a man further inside the room begin to stand, his posture suggesting he was ready to attack. Indeed his hand was already reaching for a knife that was lying on the table.

Holmes and I moved as one—striding into the room and forcing the lodger to retreat. I found I had instinctively brought up my revolver and unwaveringly pointed it at Applethorpe and his companion. I was pleased to note this seemed to impress them and both gave clear indications they had given up the possibility of attacking us.

“Keep an eye on them,” said Holmes and he disappeared out of the sitting room. I heard him continuing up the stairs, presumably to search the rooms on the next floor.

I stared at the villains and kept my gun steady as they glared back at me. But I was suddenly distracted by the faint sound of a masculine shout of pain from upstairs.

I found out the details later. The rascals had secured Mrs. Hudson in one of the lumber rooms on the second floor without fully considering the disadvantages of leaving a resourceful woman in that situation. Mrs. Hudson had unsurprisingly taken the opportunity to arm herself with an impromptu weapon selected from the broad range of bric-a-brac and had got into position ready behind the door. When a strange man kicked the door down and rushed in, she had naturally hit him with the weapon—an eighteenth century bed warmer. Of course, she had quickly realised her mistake and recognised Holmes as her putative lodger but not before she had given him quite a hefty blow.

However, I discovered all this later. Unfortunately Holmes’s cry had distracted me momentarily, and the villains took advantage of this—Applethorpe rushing to try and escape, his accomplice rushing to try and disarm me. I acted automatically, and I am afraid became the first person to indulge in the practice of shooting at 221B’s innocent sitting room wall. The shot went just past the shoulder of the villain attempting to grab my gun, and the shock was enough to make him and Applethorpe freeze and allow me to take charge of the situation again.

At this point Holmes and Mrs. Hudson came hurrying down from the floor above. Holmes ran and grabbed Applethorpe, while I grabbed the other man.

There was a pause, and for a moment the only thing that could be heard was the laboured breathing of everyone in the room.

Then Mrs. Hudson spoke, looking at her erstwhile lodger coolly.

“Mr. Applethorpe,” she said, “I am sorry to tell you that I am going to have to terminate your lease immediately—on the grounds of unreasonable behaviour.”

Holmes raised an eyebrow.

I must admit the absurdity of the entire situation then overwhelmed me and I burst out laughing.

 

 

Inspector Lestrade arrived with a couple of fine constables and the rogues were taken into custody. Mrs. Hudson then gave the inspector and ourselves the full story of her adventure.

“Last night a package was delivered for Mr. Applethorpe, or whatever the wretched man’s name is.” She sighed and took a sip of the brandy I had handed her. “Despite the lateness of the hour, I went to tell him it had arrived—I was worried it might be important.”

Inspector Lestrade was making notes. He looked up. “And what happened then?”

“I arrived at the sitting room door, and I could hear him still talking to his visitor. I paused for a moment, unsure whether I should disturb him after all and then I began to make out what they were talking about. They were plotting a burglary! At the house of Sir Alexander Caulfield!”

“They caught you listening at the door?” I asked in concern.

Mrs. Hudson looked rather embarrassed. “I must admit at this point valour somewhat overcame discretion. I was so angry that I should have burglars under my roof that I stupidly entered and told them I was going for the police that instant.”

“And so they had no choice but to lock you in the lumber room,” said Holmes, with perhaps more amusement than was appropriate.

“Indeed, sir.” Mrs. Hudson smiled weakly and gulped down some more brandy.

Lestrade put away his notebook. “Well, you have been most fortunate, madam. You certainly should be grateful to Mr. Holmes.”

“And Dr. Watson too,” said Holmes smiling at me.

“You have to take most of the credit!” I protested. “Bessie and Billy too for thinking to come to you!”

But despite my protestations I was beaming. I was heartily proud to have been part of the adventure.

Mrs. Hudson was smiling too. “I am extremely grateful to you all.” She looked at Holmes. “And of course I will be needing a new tenant now…”

 

 

And that is the full story of how Mr. Sherlock Holmes and myself, his faithful companion Dr. Watson, came to be living at 221B, Baker Street after all. And why, despite Holmes trying Mrs. Hudson’s patience to breaking point with experiments, violin music and indoor shooting, she never terminated his lease.

“Better the devil you know, Doctor,” she would say.

At least Holmes never locked her in her own lumber room.


End file.
